


Okay, You've Got Questions

by objetpetita



Series: Intimacies [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: After all John is pretty sure he's straight, Depends how you read it, Faux pas abound, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen, Humor, Light Angst, M/M, Murder, Pre-Slash, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-31
Updated: 2012-12-31
Packaged: 2017-11-23 01:28:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/616560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/objetpetita/pseuds/objetpetita
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John is still working through what it means that he's become friends with the world's only consulting detective. And now he knows that joking about it is not always such a good idea.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Okay, You've Got Questions

**Author's Note:**

> Set right after the end of "I've Only Got One," but can be read on its own. As it stands, the case is primarily a vehicle for the development of John and Sherlock's friendship, but I intend to return to the resolution of this case in future installments. Not especially canon-attentive after "A Study in Pink."

A week had passed, and the man who had orchestrated that disconcerting, touching caress of John’s face with his own was also the man pronouncing, quite loudly and clearly, in John’s general direction: “INCEST! _That_ was what no one accounted for! The marriage records, the scams, all of it explained by an incestuous relationship between the two burglars!”

John frowned. “Don’t, Sherlock. Do _not_ sound gleeful about incest, that is completely creepy.” He turned and marched away from the bustle of Scotland Yard tucking an (apparently incestuous) pair of serial burglars into a police car. 

The detective harrumphed and followed closely. “Why should it matter to _you_ one way or another if an aunt and a nephew are romantically involved? Any feelings of discomfort on your part are merely the result of social convention.”

“I don’t care,” John called over his shoulder. “Incest is taboo because it makes people _uncomfortable_.” He shuddered. “Deeply uncomfortable.” 

“As ever, you confuse a cause for an effect.” Sherlock continued to flap along after him, clearly frustrated by John’s failure to find the case’s resolution satisfying.

“Cause, effect, doesn’t matter, Sherlock, _no,_ I am not having this conversation. From now on, we talk about incest as little as possible, and never in detail.”

A sharp intake of breath told him that a retort was on its way, so John cut Sherlock off before he could start. “If you say anything more about it I’m going to start narrating a slow striptease by Mycroft. Loudly, in minute detail.”

A few beats of silence. John grinned. One small victory for social convention.

“That would be revolting, undoubtedly, but in fact would have very little to do with—”

John covered his ears and started yelling about undoing waistcoat buttons.

 

Jesus Christ, the man was terrifying. 

John was alone with a cup of coffee at a table in Speedy’s. They’d been home all of five minutes before Sherlock started in on the various ways the toes of one Mr. Michael Blackstone might have been disconnected from his body. John could only watch regretfully as his leftover Chinese turned unappetizing right before his eyes. 

And then he’d panicked. Not solely because of the toes, or the incest conversation, or the fucking incomprehensible wire-and-clothespin experiment suspended from the kitchen ceiling, but because of all of it, taken together, was simply too much to handle. “He’s insane,” John muttered to his coffee cup. “I’m living with a lunatic.”

Now, in the subdued bustle of the cafe, the wave of anxiety began to subside. This, here, was normal, the solid pale grey of the table, the half-heartedly yellowing floor, the the thin paper cup burning his fingers. 

221B Baker Street was somewhere altogether different. A place that threatened to swallow John entirely in bursts of color and busy patterns. 

John wondered if letting this world overtake him would make him forget the grey of life-as-usual—the slow burn of cheap coffee in flimsy cups, of work and bills and sport and telly. He wondered if surrendering his hold on normality would be more likely to keep him alive or to kill him.

In the end, John’s cup emptied and he simply shuffled back up to the flat, just as he suspected he would all along. Uncharacteristically, however, Sherlock looked up when he entered the room. Whatever he saw on John’s face made something soften at the corners of his mouth, and he lifted his hand ever so slightly, his palm pale beneath the thin shadows of his fingers. It might’ve been a kind of wave, so John nodded, shrugged as if to say, “well, it seems I’ve decided to come back,” and plopped down into the nearest armchair. 

 

Later, to fortify himself against the disconcerting clarity of that moment (all the more disconcerting for having been entirely unspoken), John resolved to do three random, erratic things for which Sherlock would be unable to deduce his motivations. First, he laundered his bedclothes, though they’d been cleaned only a week before. Second, he dusted the violin and nothing else. Third, he made risotto, didn’t eat a bite of it, and left it out on the kitchen table for a day and a half.

 

The next case wasn’t long in coming. To Sherlock’s evident delight, Anderson’s forensics team had proved unable to come up with any trace whatsoever of an assailant on or around the body of a victim (Martin de Vries, according to the cards in his wallet) thrown from the fourth floor window of a flat whose usual inhabitants were on holiday in Belgium. There were clear signs of a struggle both on the victim’s body and throughout the living room and bedroom of the flat, but no stray hairs or scuffs from shoes that didn’t match the victim’s.

Within four minutes, Sherlock was certain that the victim did not work regular hours and made a fairly comfortable living with his hands. “Likely a musician,” said the detective, dropping the victim’s wrist. “With an estranged twin brother.” 

“What?” John and Lestrade said at once.

“Whom he saw for the first time in years shortly before he was killed,” Sherlock continued. “I need to know whether it’s possible for a limp body dropped from a third floor window—”

Lestrade interjected more firmly this time. “You mean from a _fourth_ floor window.” He was visibly surprised at the oversight. 

Sherlock sniffed. “As your own forensics team, such as it is, has managed to observe, there is no sign of there having been more than one person in the flat on the fourth floor.” 

“Yeah, but—”

“A struggle like that? Breaking nearly every vase, every picture frame? Leaving behind ripped-out hairs, shreds of fabric? There would be some sign of a second person; nobody could fight that hard and fail to make some mark on their assailant.”

“It’s too neat,” John ventured.

Sherlock nodded and swept his arms wide. “Someone took great care to make it look like there was a fight on the fourth floor, probably in an effort to draw attention from the much more interesting site where the crime was actually committed. The building only goes up to the fourth floor and has no roof access; thus, unlikely that the killer could have dropped him from there. So, as I was saying, I need to know whether it’s possible for a body dropped onto a grate like this from a _third_ floor window to have lacerations this deep”—he gestured toward the victim’s right forearm—“and bruising in this pattern”—a sweep of his hand indicated the victim’s shoulder.

Anderson snorted loudly. “You haven’t even seen his shoulder,” he protested. “How do you know there’s bruising?”

“Anderson, he was thrown from the _third floor_ , there will undoubtedly be bruising,” Sherlock shot back condescendingly. “Lestrade will tell Molly Hooper to let me into the autopsy.” Lestrade’s frustrated grunt was lost as Sherlock talked right over him. “I will pass the time in the interim at Bart’s.”

“What, dropping corpses?” Donovan asked, scandalized.

“Obviously.” 

The man in the long coat was gone before John had managed to stop giggling at Anderson’s indignation and Donovan’s speechlessness. 

 

A text arrived on John’s phone in short order, and the message made even less sense than usual. 

_Need exactly the following. Charge to Mycroft’s account. SH_  

What followed were four picture messages, each featuring an article of clothing. A button-up shirt in a soft red color. A pair of trousers, cut very slim. A pair of narrow leather brogues. Finally, and most oddly, a pair of boxer briefs emblazoned with bright yellow stripes. 

John got as far as typing the first three letters of “ _Where?_ ” before another message interrupted him with an address. 

In the cab, something occurred to him, and he pulled out his phone again. _How do you know they’ll let me use Mycroft’s account? JW_

_Because no one would be stupid enough to use it without permission. SH_

John considered this. _So... we have permission? JW_

There was no answer to that. Which was really not comforting.

The shop turned out to be the sort of place John would normally consider too expensive to so much as consider glancing into. He straightened the hem of his jumper, stilled his stupid quivering hand in a fist, and pulled open the door.

Immediately, a man with long hair that swooped straight upward— _must have a pint of product in to make it stay like that—_ materialized at John’s side. His eyes swept John up and down several times over, as though he wasn’t sure what to make of such an incongruous presence in his place of work. “May I... help you?” he ventured politely. 

John drew himself up and tried to look like a magnificently well-off eccentric who could afford not to care about his baggy old jumper. “Yes,” he said, hoping to sound haughty. “I’m here as a favor for Sherlock—er, and Mycroft—Holmes.” He tried not to let his voice curl the words up into a question mark at the end.

The man’s face relaxed and a polite eagerness took over his eyes. “Of course, sir. I hope they are both well?” 

“Oh, yes,” John supplied with relief. “Quite well, only... also quite busy.” The man nodded agreeably. “Thing is, I have some photos of what Sherlock wants me to pick up...” he fumbled with the buttons on his phone, “...yes, here.” He held the phone out at arm’s length.  

The man laced his fingers together and nodded once after John had scrolled through all four messages. His perfectly sculpted eyebrows quirked up and down as he looked back to John for a final once-over. There was something playing about in his eyes, a glimmer of curiosity and recognition at once. John met his gaze as though he understood perfectly what was going on, thank you very much. 

“He does have such good taste, doesn’t he,” the man commented, leaning in conspiratorially. 

John nodded. “Ye-es, I suppose he does.”

“No need to be humble with me, sir,” the man replied with a wide smile. John smiled back, feeling very much as though they were having a conversation in a language he only half knew. The man laughed lightly and cupped a hand beneath John’s elbow. John’s feet followed automatically as the man steered him through the store. 

“Do you know your sizes already, or shall I take your measurements?” The man produced a measuring tape from his pocket.

John nearly laughed. “Oh, no, these aren’t for me,” he explained quickly. “I’m only picking them up for Sherlock.” 

The man paused and cocked his head to the side, his eyes crinkling with amusement.  “Did he say they were for him?”

John thought back. “No, but I don’t think—”

“It’s only that I’m quite sure Mr. Holmes wouldn’t select this shade of red for himself,” the man managed somehow to politely interrupt. “It wouldn’t suit his coloring. And the cut of these trousers is designed for someone... a bit smaller.”

The man allowed John a pregnant pause. John only stared back blankly.

“I think perhaps Mr. Holmes is surprising you with a gift,” he explained slowly. As John’s mouth fell open a bit, the man grasped his arm higher in pleasure. “Oh, I love a romantic gesture like this. I simply _adore_ it.”

For whatever reason, John didn’t comment that he wasn’t gay. Perhaps it was sheer curiosity that drove him to grin instead. 

“I don’t know what goes on in his head sometimes,” he said. 

The coiffed man fluttered his fingers. “You must be very special to him, darling; he’s so enigmatic, you know. For the longest time, I wasn’t even sure he was _gay._ ” A hand settled over his heart. “Though of course I always hoped, a little.” He grinned and touched John’s shoulder with his own. “Quite the catch, well done you.”

This was strange. But not unpleasant, John decided. Might as well find out what he could while he had the opportunity. The question of why Sherlock wanted him to have expensive clothes could be pursued later. “So, has he ever... bought clothes... for anyone else?” 

The other man eyed him for moment while he stretched the measuring tape from John’s wrist to his shoulder. He seemed to be suspended between loyalty to Sherlock (or Mycroft, since apparently that’s how Sherlock could afford such nice suits) and a desire to impress John.

_Might as well commit to the role_ , thought John. He recalled the remark from earlier about good taste and decided to take a gamble. Shifting his weight, he flexed his arm a bit beneath the man’s grip. “If I’m only one in a long string of fellows, I’d rather know now than later.” He squared his shoulders and tried to look stoic. 

It was just enough. The man rolled up his measuring tape and patted John’s shoulder with such feeling, John began to feel a little guilty for the charade. Though evidently not nearly guilty enough to stop. 

“You aren’t the first man he’s brought here,” offered the man, now efficiently sifting through shirts and yet keeping his attention focused on John. “But there was only one other, and I couldn’t even be sure if they were together. It was ages ago, too.”

“Was it?” 

“Mm. I remember they each bought cufflinks, the same ones.” He looked up at John’s face, noticed John’s brow furrowed. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Strictly in confidence,” he winked, “it was nothing like this. It seemed stiff, almost like a transaction, with the elder Mr. Holmes presiding.”

“Mycroft was there buying cufflinks with Sherlock and another man?” Now this was a perplexing image. As far as John could tell, Mycroft and Sherlock spent as little time as possible in the same room, and then only when there were the lives of British citizens at stake. He couldn’t imagine them out together doing something like shopping for cufflinks. 

A flicker of doubt crossed the man’s normally smooth expression. “Maybe I shouldn’t have said.” 

John shook his head as though brushing the thought away. “Oh, no, it doesn’t matter one way or another.” Internally, though, his mind was buzzing. Matching cufflinks sounded like a serious sort of thing, didn’t they? Had Sherlock had an actual romantic relationship before John had met him? It seemed utterly out of character for the man who had literally closed a door in John’s face the one time John tried to solicit his perspective on a woman John had been dating. 

And hadn’t Sherlock said, that night after breaking up the drugs ring, something about not knowing what sex was like? John had been half out of his mind with fatigue after that case, and everything about that night had been so weird, he hadn’t had time to react before Sherlock had gone rattling on about touching and intimacy and kissing.

By now, the man had acquired the trousers, shoes, and shirt. He draped the lot over his arm and steered John again with another gentle squeeze. “But as I say, it was ages ago,” he assured. “And _awkward_ , I mean it.” He paused. “Though I’ll thank you not to mention I said that to either Mr. Holmes?”

John nodded quickly. There was something just a little bit heady about how eager  this man was to please him. Sales _women_ never paid him more than the slightest notice; perhaps he was more of a catch in the gay world. _Pity,_ he thought vaguely. 

The man was smiling. “Anyway, compared to those cufflinks, his surprise for you is _much_ more romantic.” 

John marveled at that idea as the other man produced a bright striped pair of boxer briefs and added them to his arm. “Romantic” seemed a downright comical way of describing the situation at hand. Not least because he was only here in the first place on orders from a man whose usual gifts to him were things like “Skin cells on kitchen table; do not eat anything” written in felt-tip pen on the screen of his phone while he was in the shower. 

At last, the posh man wrapped everything up into boxes and bags. “Your man has quite the eye,” he said as he did so. “These should all fit _quite_ in the way they’re meant to.” 

John left the shop feeling flushed, conspicuous, and fantastically curious about this new information about his flatmate’s past. 

 

In the St. Bart’s lab, Sherlock’s phone buzzed. _Tell me the salesperson’s idea of this purchase is not the correct one. JW_

A few minutes later, the phone buzzed again. _Also tell me you’re not imagining I’ll even entertain the idea of wearing these pants. JW_

A smile crept across Sherlock’s lips as he turned away from the cadaver he’d just dropped, with Molly’s help, from the highest point in the lab. _If his idea was that we’re going undercover at a club tomorrow night, and that you’ll find you actually like those pants, it was quite correct. SH_

_Git. JW_

John walked into 221B to find Sherlock turned upside down in the squashy brown armchair. His feet hung over the back, still in shoes, and his head dangled off of the front of the seat. He was completely still, his hands folded in his lap, his eyes focused on an imagined point in the distance. 

“Hm,” said John. 

John heated some soup and drank a beer. He glanced at Sherlock’s chest every few minutes, the tiny rise and fall that reassured him that his flatmate hadn’t gone and died right there in the living room. 

Eventually, the detective’s eyes refocused and took in John, seated opposite, idly flipping the pages of a medical journal. “You’re not reading.”

John tried not to jump. “No,” he agreed. “Just... looking at the pictures.”

His flatmate’s eyes narrowed. “Of infectious skin diseases?”

“Like that’s any weirder than any of the other things we do in this flat.”

“Hm. You’re deflecting. Would have been a more effective lie if you’d made something up about noticing a possible skin condition on the victim’s face earlier today.”

John sighed and flipped the medical journal over on his lap. “Fine, I’ll play. Sherlock, I noticed a possible skin condition on the victim’s face earlier today.”

“Interesting line of inquiry, John,” Sherlock offered agreeably. John wondered if he fed lines to the skull as well. “But if you’d looked more closely you’d have found a small break in the skin along the underside of his jaw, clearly made by a sharp, thin blade.”

The expectant look Sherlock gave him was rendered no less annoying by the fact that it was upside down. John rested his chin on one hand and shrugged. “So?”

“The slight irritation on his skin was only to be found on the lower half of his face and upper half of his neck,” Sherlock supplied immediately. “Obviously not a skin condition, then. Our victim recently received a new shaving kit—probably a gift, given the expensive fragrance of the shaving foam left behind his earlobe and the relatively cheap quality of his clothes. Unfamiliar blade results in the nick to his jaw; unfamiliar product sets off a slight allergic reaction.”

“Amazing.” John felt himself leaning forward now, elbows coming to rest on his knees.

“But there’s more,” Sherlock bellowed theatrically. “An expensive shaving kit is the sort of gift a sibling or a partner gives, most likely for a birthday. The shaving foam forgotten behind his ear suggests he was alone and in a hurry when he shaved his face last night. But alone, in a hurry, and shaving in the evening? Why?”

“Cheating on his girlfriend?” John guessed. “Shaving for a date in the evening but worried about getting caught?”

Sherlock contorted, stretching his palms down to flatten against the floor. “Possibly. Need more data.”

There was something about the inscrutable calm on Sherlock’s face that drove a warm flush up John’s arms and neck. He was seized with a strange desire to hold a match beneath his flatmate’s dangling head and see if he even _could_ catch on fire, or if he simply melted away like a very angular, well-dressed ice sculpture.

There was a light tapping on John’s temple and he realized it was his own fingertip, right over the spot where—was it only a few weeks ago?—Sherlock had pressed his nose in a bout of drug-induced gratitude. A detail neither he nor Sherlock had mentioned since. The one and only time they’d come close to the subject was on the morning after, when John had made a joke about Sherlock’s insistence on a bedtime story and left it at that.

John shook himself and lowered his hand. That night was merely one episode in the serially weird friendship that comprised the very fabric of his life these days. In fact, that one night of profound chemical impairment seemed rather eclipsed by the web of more pressing inquiries he’d generated in the last twelve hours. 

Sherlock was watching him. “You’ve got questions.”

“Oh yeah, lots,” said John, not bothering to ask how Sherlock could tell. “How did you know about the estranged twin brother? Where does going to a club tomorrow night come into this? Why do I need new pants that cost more than a week’s groceries?” 

Questions started to pile up on top of one another. “While I’m at it, do all _your_ pants cost more than a week’s groceries? You must go to that stupidly expensive shop quite a bit, since the man with the big hair fancies you—had you noticed? Do you ever flirt back? Have you had serious relationships? Who on earth was the man you bought matching cufflinks with? I’ve never seen you wear cufflinks; so why buy them?”

The expression on Sherlock’s face had started to shift, to furrow and twist. Perhaps not good, then. John tried to backtrack with a joke. “You... you haven’t got some mad romantic history involving a secret wife locked up in the attic, have you?” 

Sherlock’s expression went blank. In one fluid motion, he swung his legs up and forward and flipped himself upright. Without turning to face John, he stalked away into his bedroom and shut the door with a click. 

The rush of guilt was immediate. “Oh, Jesus,” said John. He stood and went to the door his flatmate had disappeared into. “Sherlock, I am so sorry.” There was silence on the other side, and John pressed his forehead against the wood. “Sherlock,” he pleaded. “Damn it, please forget I said any of that. It was bloody tactless and I’m sorry.”

No response. 

“Okay, listen.” John took a deep breath. If nothing else, this proved that the man was human, a fact John had honestly found himself doubting from time to time. Perhaps Sherlock Holmes, like anyone else, would appreciate being given a little space, followed by a little groveling. “I’m going to make tea, and then I’m going to come back. And then I’m going to apologize again. Until you either forgive me or tell me to fuck off.” 

When John returned, the bedroom door opened just far enough to admit a single pale hand. The hand turned upward expectantly. Shaking his head in relief and disbelief at once, John handed over the extra mug of tea he’d made in the hope of enticing Sherlock to come into the other room. 

The hand disappeared and the lock clicked back into place, but there was an audible swish and thump as Sherlock slid to the floor and sat with his back against the door. John took this as an invitation and mirrored Sherlock’s position. Intending to keep his promise, he started to speak. 

“I really am—”

“There was a scrap of paper. In the victim’s wallet.” Sherlock’s voice, quieter than usual, interrupted him.

“A name and phone number for one Christopher de Vries. Shares a surname with our victim, Martin de Vries—likely a family member, but not one he’s close with. The deceased used his full, formal name and wrote his number down on paper instead of putting it into his phone. Not on good terms, and not in contact for a long time—estranged, then. In his coat pocket, a photograph of two teenage boys indistinguishable from one another, newly printed but clearly taken at least fifteen years ago judging by the quality of the image. On the back, in someone else’s hand, ‘Love from Kit.’ Kit is likely Christopher, trying to re-establish the family connection.”

“Brilliant,” John breathed. 

There was a pause. 

“And the club?” 

“Trace of a stamp on his hand,” Sherlock mumbled. “At the door, they put a stamp on your hand to show you’ve paid to get in.”

“And let me guess. The pants are half for the disguise and half to spite Mycroft.”

Another pause, long enough that John started to decide never to try joking again, but then... was that snickering? John strained to hear. Yes. Brilliant. _Well done, Watson; you’re not a complete arse._

“Sherlock?” John traced the grain of the wood on the doorjamb with his fingertips. “I really am sorry about the... well, everything I said. I didn’t think.”

Sherlock grunted. “Shut up.” 

John stilled, leaned his head backward against the door, and silently cursed.

“My... _pants_...” Sherlock began slowly, “cost several times more than I spend on a week’s groceries, but that’s primarily because I seldom buy groceries.”

John opened his eyes but did not move. He thought of a dream he used to have when he was in school, whenever he was studying for exams. It always began in the middle of a crowded place, a familiar place, and then suddenly he would realize he was alone in the dark, standing in the middle of something flat, frozen, and very thin. He simply had to stand gingerly and wait until he woke up to find himself on solid ground again. 

John waited. And continued to obey Sherlock’s order to shut up.

The big, deep voice rolled onward. “I have indeed noticed that Michael from the shop fancies me, but I have never flirted back because I don’t find him interesting and I don’t see the point. I feel even less inclined to flirt back now that he’s apparently babbled to you about the cufflinks, items which I purchased in a fit of stupidity and youth.”

John spared a small pitying thought for poor Michael. 

“And finally, the answers to your least graceful questions, which are also the questions that occasioned my hasty retreat, all have the same answer, and his name is Victor.” Sherlock’s voice deepened but remained even. Something hummed beneath his gravelly tone—something that might’ve been disgust. 

“After the deaths of my parents, Mycroft became unreasonably controlling. I... reacted stupidly. But effectively. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so disapproving.”

Sherlock’s voice faltered, and John heard the sound of fingers drumming anxiously against the floor. Was this grief at remembering an ex-lover, or self-reproach for having done something so normal? 

Either way, John stepped in to help, because he thought he understood, at least partly. “Mycroft hates sentiment, so you did the most sentimental thing you could think of.”

Sherlock’s throat cleared, but the rapping of his fingers continued. “Yes. Proposal, civil partnership, even put that dull idiot in my will.”

“Did...” John trailed off, not wanting to push too far. 

“Did I love him?” A brief, humorless chuckle. “Who can tell.” 

Thinking about this turned John’s mind inward. He wondered what sort of man had agreed to share his life with Sherlock Holmes. A novelist specializing in mysteries? A scientist? A cheekbone fetishist?

It wasn’t until the bedroom door opened that he realized he’d fallen silent for over a minute. With the door gone from behind him, he tipped backward and found himself sprawled at Sherlock’s feet. 

“It was quiet enough I thought you might’ve left.” Sherlock grinned. “I was going to compliment the much-improved lightness of your step.”

John looked up at him, took in the pallor of his skin, the tired droop in his shoulders. “I don’t think you left the room just because I asked questions about Victor.”

“Oh?”

“I think you would have brushed the whole thing off, except then I made a joke that implied I thought you might be mad and cruel just because you’ve never mentioned having anyone.”

Sherlock crouched down so he was looking directly downward into John’s face. “I’ve reconsidered the comparison,” he said matter-of-factly, “and realized that if I’m Rochester with a madwoman in the attic, that makes you Jane Eyre. Which is a parallel I find amusing.” 

John giggled. “You should know, though, that I don’t think you’re mad or cruel,” he said. “And I am very sorry for suggesting it, even as a joke.” 

“Apology accepted,” murmured Sherlock. His eyes were finally laughing again, and he rested a hand on John’s cheek as though it was the most natural thing in the world. 

John’s face burned red for the rest of the night. 

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback and britpicking are very much welcome here, and thanks so much for reading!


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